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In the most inactive summer of Brian Burke’s time running the Maple Leafs, you have to wonder: What did his friend, Gary Bettman, tell him about the coming season?

And can Burke’s quiet approach to making over the Leafs be attributed in any way to a belief there will not be an NHL season?

Burke never went out an acquired the veteran goaltender he said he wasn’t going to get at the end of last season. He wasn’t in any way aggressive in the free agent market, which is understandable considering the mistakes made in the past. He never found the first-line centre he hoped for — and has this odd belief that James vanRiemsdyk, a winger with talent and marginal success, can be that centre.

The biggest names on the Leafs — Dion Phaneuf, Phil Kessel, James Reimer — are not playing overseas, getting ready for a season that might not be.

Without playing this season, the Leafs don’t have to account for the final years on the contracts of players such as Tim Connolly, Matthew Lombardi, Clarke MacArthur and Tyler Bozak, which frees up $13 million in salaries for starting over post-lockout. A chance to begin anew with youngsters like Morgan Rielly not that far away.

You wonder: What was Burke told about this season? You wonder, with his closeness to the league and his friendship with Bettman, what he’s known all along.

THIS AND THAT

Baseball has always been about karma, maybe more than any other sport. And there was Drew Storen on the mound Friday night, the former Montreal Expos batboy, unable to close, unable hold a lead for the Washington Nationals team which used to be the Expos. It was like worlds were colliding and heroes whose names we barely know — Daniel Descalso and Pete Kozma — were eliminating the used-to-be Expos and the batboy closer ... George Kottaras was nine-years-old and living in Markham when the Blue Jays won their first World Series. The Jays haven’t been to the playoffs in 19 years. but Kottaras, the Canadian catcher, has been part of three big-league teams, Oakland, Milwaukee and Boston. All three teams went to the playoffs in his five major league seasons ... Jerry Sandusky got a 30-year sentence, which is essentially life in prision. Graham James received a two-year sentence. Canadian justice, please explain ... The new Ottawa CFL team won’t be called the Rough Riders, which is a shame for those of us who loved the fact that Roughriders and Rough Riders could compete against each other in the same league. Here’s hoping they dress in the traditional black, though ... Could Jim Barker, on the last year of his contract, end up as GM of the Ottawa expansion franchise? Could be.

HEAR AND THERE

A former NHL star, whose views I value, said this about his experience in losing a full season to lockout: “In the last lockout, we were told we would not give in to a salary cap and we were willing to fight for that principle, no matter what. We wound up losing an entire season and gave in on the salary cap. I lost $3 million in that fight, $3 million I’ll never get back. Looking back, you wonder what were you fighting for?” ... Director Daniel Gordon’s documentary on Ben Johnson and the 1988 gold-medal race was must-see television. If you missed it the first time, TSN2 will be replaying it tonight at 9 p.m. It’s a remarkable piece of work, definitely worth seeing ... One more retort regarding the documentary named 9.79: If you didn’t believe Carl Lewis was a smug and dishonest creep before, you will witness it first hand here. And somewhat creepier than Lewis: His manager at the time, Joe Douglas, who came across as one of those bad guys from an Austin Powers movie ... The retirement of Dominik Hasek comes with an active discussion over who is the best goaltender of all time. The subject is purely subjective, but it is rich. The best I’ve ever seen, in no particular order: Hasek, Patrick Roy, Martin Brodeur, Terry Sawchuk, Jacques Plante, Glenn Hall. Just missing the list: Ken Dryden ... What I’d love to see: Game 7, Tigers and Yankees, CC Sabathia versus Justin Verlander ... Has playoff baseball ever been better than it has in the past week? Nine games in the division series settled in the ninth inning.

SCENE AND HEARD

I can predict with absolute certainty that the World Series-winning manager will be a former catcher. The reason that’s certain: Jim Leyland, Joe Girardi, Mike Matheny and Brucy Bochy all played catcher ... Another reason to wonder about John Farrell, the former pitcher. No pitcher has won a World Series as manager since Tommy Lasorda, back in 1988 ... This actually happened in a golf tournament — a two-man scramble — on Thursday. My partner, a kid who should be tested for steroids, drove the green on a 340-yard Par 4. Five putts later (three of them mine) we ended up with a six ... Why playoff baseball is amazing and nonsensical: Jim Johnson, who saved 51 of 54 attempts for the Orioles, basically cost Baltimore two games and maybe the series against the Yankees ... What Blue Jay could you see doing the Raul Ibanez thing and coming off the bench for pinch hit home runs in the post-season? Ed Sprague maybe. Who today? ... The Jays will be watching Tigers’ starter Anibal Sanchez closely though the post-season. They have their eyes on him come free agency ... The Sunday essay question: Who dresses Gregg Zaun?

AND ANOTHER THING

Christine Sinclair had to know it was coming. The question was: How long a punishment? Sinclair will likely become the first to win Canada’s athlete of the year while under suspension. But at least her suspension won’t affect any Canadian games that truly matter, like the coming World Cup ... Is Anthony Calvillo really starting to show the signs of age or is he just victim of the first lousy football team he has been on in years? This Sunday afternoon game at home is huge for the Argos if they truly want to be Grey Cup contenders ... When Chris Rudge says the Grey Cup is sold out, he’s really not kidding. “I wish we had 70,000 seats available,” said the Argos’ president. “We could have sold that many seats.” ... Why you can’t really take pre-season basketball seriously: You hear things like Ed Davis played well .... It may be just me but I miss hearing Tim Micallef doing CIS football games on The Score ... At what point did all of sports media turn to political punditry? Imagine a group of serious political writers tweeting play by play of a sporting event the way so many managed on the U.S. vice-presidential debate ... In the end, all the Stephen Strasburg talk amounted to what? The Nationals are still playing today if they could have held a six-run lead against St. Louis ... Happy birthday to Sylvain Lefebvre (45), Girardi (48), Tom Kurvers (50), Dave (the Hammer) Schultz (63), Zac Henderson (57), Willie Mays Aikens (58), Al Oliver (66) and Stacy Keibler (33) ... And hey, whatever became of Otis Nixon?

FARRELL’S DOUBLESPEAK

What John Farrell doesn’t say is often more important than what he does say.

In his recent interview with MLB-TV, Farrell sounded as though he was waiting for the call to become manager of the Boston Red Sox, even if his words indicated otherwise.

When asked about the situation, he said: “Nothing has been communicated to me as far as if the Red Sox have contacted Alex (Anthopoulos). I’m unaware of that. So where it stands is what I said — manager of the Blue Jays.”

To date, neither Jays president Paul Beeston nor GM Anthopoulos have been absolute in Farrell’s future in Toronto.

They could have been definitive in saying he isn’t going anywhere and they are signing him long-term. That would have put an end to the story. They haven’t done that.

My interpretation: Farrell wants to take the Red Sox job, the Jays would like to be well compensated for it, and both sides are letting this play out.

AWESTRUCK ORIOLES?

If you were a Baltimore Orioles player, matched up against the big, rich New York Yankees, you probably didn’t know whether to play the game or ask somebody for an autograph.

Consider this: The team the Orioles went the distance with had in its lineup, Derek Jeter, Hall of Famer; Ichiro Suzuki, Hall of Famer; Alex Rodriguez, pretty certain Hall of Famer; Mark Teixeira and Robinson Cano, quite possibly Hall of Famers. Not to mention long-time all-stars like Andy Pettitte and CC Sabathia on the mound. And sitting in the dugout in uniform, Mariano Rivera, greatest closer of all-time, a Hall of Fame lock. The odds are, not a single Orioles player from this team will ever make the Hall of Fame. So imagine years from now, they will be able to tell the story of how they went 162 games head to head with the Yankees, and then five more in a memorable playoff series they could have won. It was that close.

NHL ENTHUSIASM DYING

Whatever enthusiasm and excitement I once had for the National Hockey League is slowly being beaten out of me by the grim and unnecessary lockout of players.

And I suspect I am not alone.

If I could understand the damage both sides are willing to be party to in the name of hardline stances by both the league’s owners and the Players’ Association, then maybe my view would change.

But all I see is ownership, contadicting itself by pushing for salary rollbacks and percentage of league revenue, asking for far too much, far too quickly.

And all I see are players, the most entitled in history, unwilling to budge in any kind of give back, living off unrealistic numbers of 57% of hockey-related revenue. Obviously, there is a solution here, although none apparent.

With two sides holding their breath, turning blue in the face, the page is turning, the season is going and the worst part, disinterest can be contagious.

Other Stories

Chris Rossetti was in the library at the University of Guelph, partially studying, his mind drifting as it always did to his favourite subject, his favourite dream: How was he going to get a job in professional sports?